A Passing Curse (2011)

by C R Trolson

  “Dinner and a movie first,” she said. “It might cheer both of us up.”

  He kissed the top of her head. “You never told me why you became an archeologist. I think it fits you, being outdoors, looking back in time, trying to fit the past together from old bones.”

  Her face perked up. “I want you to listen to something.” She stood and pulled a green cylinder from her pocket. The same one she had palmed at the jail, to keep him from seeing. She put the cylinder to her lips and paused. Something crossed her face.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked.

  “Nothing,” she said quickly and handed him the cylinder. “It’s a charm stone, a whistle carved from California jade hundreds of years ago, maybe longer.”

  “It looks like a whale.” He turned the whistle over in his hands. He noticed Et El Hoc carved along the side. “In his office, Ajax has glass cases filled with junk. Sandals. Skulls. A carved doll. He has three pieces like this. I didn’t know they were whistles.”

  She took the whistle. “He has three like this? Yes, I remember him telling me. The whistles were fairly common.”

  “There were originally four,” he said. “The velvet was dark where the fourth one had been.” She looked at him strangely and he wondered what was scaring her.

  “Listen.” She closed her eyes. She touched the whistle to her slightly chapped lips. He watched her hesitate, as if the whistle might explode. The first sound was a long screech until she got the pitch right, then the sound smoothed out to a low hum. She stopped. She looked around the room.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked again. “When you blew the whistle you acted like something would happen. You hesitated. Like you were spooked, ready to run.”

  “Something did happen,” she said. “You heard the same sound that someone heard two hundred or two thousand years ago. Think of that. A link to the past.”

  “It hurt my ears.”

  “A connection to another world,” she said. “An old world, maybe a dead world to some people, but a new world because we’ve never been there.” She paused. “I didn’t tell you the whole story.”

  “The mission?”

  She nodded. “Curled in skeleton number two’s hand.” She handed it back to him. “See the initials? The little ones on the other side?”

  “You tried to re-pack the dirt around the fingers. You tried to hide it.”

  She nodded. “You noticed.”

  What else wasn’t she telling him, he thought, and ran his index finger over the engraving. “Et El Hoc on one side and PKH on the other?”

  She told him about Hamsun finding the whale years earlier and engraving his initials. She told him about the Sok-su-uh. She told him about Et El Hoc - To fear the creature - probably carved into the whale by the original artist, an Indian holy man, a shaman. She told him the whistle would summon an Indian princess, killed by the Sok-su-uh, who would return to this life for revenge, to kill the Sok-su-uh. She told him about the Chumash believing that Father Delgado, Ajax’s look alike and long lost relative, was the blood eater, the Sok-su-uh. She told him about Ajax’s reaction to Professor Hamsun’s essay.

  “Is that all?” he asked.

  She hesitated. And then, with a grimace, seemed to make up her mind. “I’ve been seeing things. When I first blew the whistle, a girl appeared. An Indian girl. When I touched the third stake, I saw her again, this time dressed in modern clothes. She pointed to his mansion. She screamed.”

  “You saw her twice? Can you identify her?”

  “The girl wasn’t there.”

  “If you saw her, she was there,” he said. “That’s why you didn’t want to blow the whistle just now?” he asked, thinking, it wasn’t any worse than him carrying silver bullets. “You thought the girl would appear? The girl who’d kill the Sok-su-uh? Kill Ajax. Did she tell you to kill Ajax?”

  “Command hallucinations?” she asked and shook her head. “No little voices in my head.”

  “You wouldn’t tell me anyway.”

  “I wouldn’t? I just told you I’m having visions. I’m not only seeing things but I’m hearing things. Screaming. I’m seeing ghosts. What’s the difference? I’d tell you if a hallucination was telling me to kill the richest man in the world.”

  Neither of them spoke. He finally asked, “Hamsun didn’t pull a switch? The whistle you found was the same whistle he found in 1963. You’re sure?”

  “I believe him.”

  “You have an explanation?”

  “Nothing I want to think about now.” She put the whistle in the dresser drawer and began undoing the buttons of her shirt. He touched her hands. “Let me do that.”

  Thomkins parked the forlorn Ford one block down from the mission. He slipped along the street, staying in the shadows of oak and juniper. He moved cautiously. The streetlights were bright and he didn’t want a citizen reporting a prowler. The fog came finally, obscuring the full moon.

  He was still feeling good about Jedi winning. He’d liked being with Rusty and Reese. Tomorrow he’d ask the Chief about keeping Jedi at his house. He didn’t want to go behind the Chief’s back too much. If he had something to show for tonight, a good clue maybe, the Chief couldn’t say no.

  He walked across the parking lot and into the mission, its stucco walls bleached bone gray in the cool air. He passed a few curtained windows dimly lit, late night readers, probably, but he was sure that most of the padres were asleep. So far, so good.

  He was almost to the spiral staircase when he heard the scrape of sandals. He ducked behind a hedge. Someone walked from a doorway directly toward him. The figure stopped three feet away. A priest. Except for sandals, he was naked and oddly white.

  Thomkins turned his head, remaining absolutely still. He heard a long sigh and splashing. He felt mist on his arm and closed his eyes. He stifled the urge to vomit. If he stood, he’d give the priest a heart attack. The priest would peg him as a Peeping Tom or worse.

  He blocked out the wine-smelling urine. The sound of it hitting the dirt. And then it stopped, another long sigh, the sound of the sandals flopping. The door shutting. The click of the lock. Damn perverts. His midnight creep was falling apart.

  He wiped his forearm on his pants. He stayed crouched for several minutes, wanting to leave, but deciding to finish what he’d started. Reese had warned him, but here he was. He’d show Reese he was not just another rookie. He made his way up the stairs. If he saw another naked priest he’d shoot him.

  The second story was deserted. He ducked under the police tape and pushed the dead priest’s heavy door open. It smelled awful inside. Like a dead cat or something larger. Funny how the smell stayed.

  He could barely see and cussed himself for not bringing his flashlight. He flicked his zippo lighter and the weak flame picked up three candles on a bench. He lit all three candles, leaving two on the table and taking one with him. The room brightened. They had cleaned up most of the blood. The little bit left in the cracks of the floor probably accounted for the smell.

  To calm himself he recited his theory: the killer had hung Ramon, then slashed him to death before locking the door from the inside and escaping down a secret passageway. The killer was, more likely than not, a priest with some knowledge of the mission’s nooks and crannies. The killer had used Rusty’s sickle to avert suspicion, typical for the sneaky priests.

  It could definitely be some weird sex thing, especially after what he’d just witnessed.

  If he found nothing tonight, no one would be the wiser. But, if he found the secret door, found out how the killer had escaped, then he might make sergeant by next year. That is, if he wasn’t in LA at the police academy. If he cracked this case, Reese would sponsor him, at least put in a good word. He was sure of it.

  He moved to the corner. He was thinking about Rusty, idly wondering if she had a sister, when hot wax hit his hand. He winced. A shadow quickly now in the corner of the room.

  Before he could focus, the shadow disappeared. It vanished so quickly that h
e realized it was only the flickering candle.

  He looked around the room again, shivered, and picked up one of the cement gargoyles sitting on the desk. The face was contorted and laughing and, in the dim light, unsettling. Using the back of the gargoyle’s skull and holding the candle at a slight angle so the wax would hit the floor instead of burning his hand, he went around the room at shoulder height, striking each of the two foot square blocks twice, listening for the dull sound that would mark the secret panel.

  After one complete circuit, he moved down to the next run of stones which were connected to the floor. It was tedious work, and in thirty minutes he had circled the room twice. He tried the floor next. Starting in the corner, he hit the first slab of slate. It sounded faintly hollow. He hit it again, and he heard two knocks in response from the far corner. An echo? And then he turned. Movement.

  He dropped the gargoyle. He dropped the candle. He pulled the small automatic from his ankle holster. He aimed in the approved kneeling style - one knee down, the other up and supporting his shooting arm.

  “Come out now!”

  The shadow did not move. Thomkins came up into the classic combat stance - feet spread, arms straight, the pistol at eye level and held on target. “Come out!”

  Suddenly the thought struck him that it must be one of the priests, and if he killed a priest he would never hear the end of it, especially if the priest was naked. “I’m not telling you again,” he said but the shadow disappeared.

  One-handed, he picked up the still flickering candle and checked each corner of the room. He looked under Ramon’s plank bed. He checked outside: nothing. If he called a patrol car to cruise the area for prowlers, they’d ask what he was doing at the mission, and if he told them he was looking for hidden doors, they’d laugh.

  He’d often imagined himself in heroic situations, but now that he might be in a heroic situation he did not feel heroic and wished Reese were here.

  He repeated his two favorite maxims: “The only thing to fear is fear itself,” and “He who dares wins.”

  No fear, he thought, and moved his eyes, looking for any sudden movement, any target to fire at.

  This time there was no mistake. The shadow came quickly and low. He was pulling the trigger, bringing the back on target after each shot, when he felt an icicle of pain shoot up his right leg. In a moment that hung like eternity, he emptied the pistol, the blasts a string of firecrackers. The shadow swung low and hit him again and again and he dropped the pistol and looked dumbly at the floor. His right leg was now shredded. Tendons and arteries fell to the floor. He watched one artery disappear inside his leg and recalled, briefly, the paramedic exam, how an artery would do that, and how to reach in with forceps and pull the artery back out before clamping it off. Blood came in long spurts. He realized how young his heart was and the waste of it all exhausted him.

  No Fear. No Fear.

  He felt air along his legs as if a fan had been turned on. He fell down in slow motion, something heavy on his chest, choking him. His hair came out in great handfuls, the roots tearing deep inside. Blood washed his face, into his mouth. No fear, no fear. He struggled, trying to kick back, his feet sliding and slipping. He screamed and felt himself still falling.

  He woke up. His hair felt stiff. His heels hurt. He reached for his head but his arms would not move. His hands felt numb. He could not move his fingers. His back felt broken.

  The blur came from the corner, the red feet incredibly fast, the flurry of wings burning the air, the heavy pain and the light snit, snit of the cutting blades.

  Wind from the flapping wings and nothing else. The light from the candle ebbed, revealing the abrupt and utter blackness. He would never see the sun rise and was strangely comforted. He was alone at last. He thought, He who dares wins, as the blackness came.

  8:30 a.m.. Reese was running late by half an hour. He walked past several tour busses. The passengers grabbing gear from overhead bins. One bus empty. Its load of Japanese snapping pictures, talking, pointing.

  He could not get the thought of her out of his mind. He’d left this morning without waking her. He could not wait to see her again. She was there, now, with him. He felt her smooth skin, the smell of almond in her hair. He carried with him the sight of her on the bed, on her back, naked, those lovely bright and ferocious green eyes half open and looking at the ceiling, mouth soft and slightly open.

  From the long arched hallway spilled Father Lavour, almost running, his sandals clip-clopping, his robe a snapping flag. “Good Morning,” Lavour said, agitated.

  “Something wrong, Father?” He could feel her skin, velvet. Her hands on him.

  “The tourists are to wait for Father Demetrius to take their donations before entering, but now they are in the mission unescorted, going everywhere!”

  “They’re harmless,” Reese said. “Take it easy.” Nothing would bother him today. Passengers streamed off one of the buses like ants. Midwesterners this time. Blue stiff cotton shorts and yellow shirts for the men. The same shorts but paisley puffed blouses and scarves for the women. The farm belt crowd elbowed in for quick pictures of the fountain and tower. The Japanese, more adventurous, spread through the mission.

  Lavour stamped his foot. “This is a historical sight and now that Father Ramon has been killed so horribly - it was on the news last night - many are only coming for the infamy of the place, for the titillation.” He stopped, frowned. “When can we get the body back? I’m still in shock. Who would do such a thing?”

  “Have you been questioned?” Reese asked.

  “Questioned? You mean interrogated? Yes, I’ve been questioned, but why question me? It is obviously the work of a lunatic. This murder.”

  “Did you notice anything peculiar that night?”

  “Only what I told the police, that Father Ramon had been arguing with the girl. I knew we should not have allowed her into the garden section. It has always been off limits.”

  “She’s really wonderful,” Reese said, ignoring Lavour’s look of agitation. He didn’t see Thomkins.

  “Wonderful? She might have killed him. Her tool, whatever it was, had Father Ramon’s blood on it. His blood.”

  “She didn’t kill anyone, Father. You need to calm down. You haven’t seen a cop hanging around have you? Red hair, thin? A young guy?”

  “I have seen no one but these dreaded tourists.”

  He left Lavour and followed the tourists. He would not let the glum priest ruin his mood. He’d give Thomkins a few quick pointers and then back to Rusty. Breakfast at Foggy Ben’s was a good idea. A walk on the beach. Perfect.

  On the stone steps that circled up to Ramon’s room, a young, wide-eyed and frantic Japanese couple flew past him, knocking him against the wall, their camera bags bouncing as if both Rodan and Godzilla were after them.

  Before he could react, he heard, “Waaaiiiieee!” and leaned deeper into the wall as two more tourists rocketed down, this time Americans and old, but moving damn fast for their age. “Hurry up, Martha,” the man in the Panama hat said over his shoulder. “Hurry up, woman!” Martha came, missing one shoe, her legs like pistons out of sync, her face red and sweaty. Terror in those eyes.

  He ran the few steps to the second floor. Ramon’s half-open door. Martha’s shoe on its side. He kicked the door open. The broken bolt clanged against the stone wall. Sunlight through the door, a trapezoid of white on Thomkins, also on his side, naked.

  His hands and feet were tied together behind his back with cotton rope, hog-tied. His body floating in a dark gash of blood. His red hair ripped out, leaving a center strip stroked with blood, spiky and fashioned into a rooster’s comb.

  In the blood surrounding Thomkins’ head, tufts of red hair grew, a field of errant grass.

  The face carried long slashes split to the bone. One eye hung by the milky blue optical nerve. The gaping carotid accounted for the blood.

  The naked chest sliced to the bone. The legs bad, long thigh muscles exposed.

&n
bsp; A fighting gaff stuck in each heel. Through the heel pad and out the back.

  At a glance, it appeared that Thomkins was running, but his face, its softness, looked more like a man sleeping in on Sunday morning than a murder victim.

  Outside, now, Lavour crooked and stone white.

  “Call the police,” Reese told him. Lavour nodded and disappeared down the stairs. Reese yelled at three tourists who appeared at the top of the stairs, wide-eyed and white-faced, to get the hell out. He faced the railing, the mansion on the far hill.

  23

  Reese heard the sirens first, then tires skidding across the parking lot and doors slamming and voices as the sirens wound down and feet coming fast up the stairs. Then four cops spilling onto the walkway, guns out, heads swiveling. A second to understand. “Thomkins?” one asked. “Is that Thomkins?” Reese nodded, starting to feel sick. One cop pointed his pistol inside the room. Reese grabbed his shoulder. “Put it away. There’s nothing to shoot.”

  He told the others to put their guns up - he didn’t need accidents, stray bullets flying - and they holstered their pistols, all looking at Thomkins lying there. “Shit,” one said. “What happened?” Shock now. Something else. The dead had a way of making you look at yourself, or pissing you off.

  He didn’t know what to say. More sirens and tires screeching as what he guessed were the rest of the police force raged up the steps in two and threes, seeing what there was to see, finally gathering in front of the door like a spent wave. All twelve of them. “What the fuck is going on?” one wailed. Others said, with some bravado, “I’ll kill the son of a bitch did this.” A young cop with spit-shined shoes kicked the stone wall. “It’s one of the priests.”

  He wondered what they’d do if he wasn’t here. Roust the priests? Beat confessions out of them? Amateurs. County cops. They had a lot to learn.

  He slammed the door, closing off Thomkins. Their mulling around made him nervous. He yelled at one cop to string yellow tape. He yelled at a few more to gather the priests for questioning. He told several more to keep the tourists contained, get them organized for questioning. He told others to fan out, to check the area for blood trails, for a knife, for bloody clothes. He told two officers to canvas the neighborhood, to knock on doors, to ask if anyone had seen or heard anything suspicious, out of the ordinary.